Saint-Maurice

Saint-Maurice is a Swiss municipality in the canton of Valais, capital of the district of the same name. Its territory covers 14.94 km², of which 45.6% is forest, 17.6% buildings and infrastructure, 16.2% agricultural land and 20.5% unproductive land, according to the 2013-2018 survey. The municipality merged on 1 January 2013 with its neighbour Mex, following a vote on 27 November 2011 approved by 88% in Saint-Maurice and 72% in Mex.

Inhabited since antiquity under the Roman name Agaune (Acaunum), the place takes its present name from the legendary massacre of the Theban Legion and its leader, Maurice, a Black soldier from Egypt. The Abbey of Saint-Maurice d'Agaune was founded there in 515 on the site of the martyrs' tomb: it is the oldest monastery in the West in continuous activity. Even before the 6th century, the Saint-Maurice pass was defended by a toll gate, backed by a round watchtower on the neighbouring rock to signal pilgrim convoys; in the 10th century, the town was the capital of Transjurane Burgundy. A stage on the Via Francigena to Rome, it is mentioned by Archbishop Sigeric in 990 under the name LI Sce Maurici, then by Nikulas of Munkathvera around 1154.

In 1349, a quarter of the Agaunese population died of the plague. From the summer of 1602, two Capuchin friars sent by Francis de Sales preached in the Valais Chablais to push back Protestantism; they first settled outside the walls in 1611, then built their convent inside the town from 1639, its church consecrated on 30 November 1656. On 23 February 1693, a great fire starting from the abbey destroyed the town. Saint-Maurice was the first Valais municipality to plant a liberty tree, on 28 January 1798, after the arrival on 2 January of the French chargé d'affaires Michel Ange Mangourit; Lower Valais, subject land of the Upper Valais Seven Tithings since 1475, where Saint-Maurice was the seat of the Upper Valais governor, then gained its independence.

At the end of 2024, the municipality had 4,623 inhabitants, for a density of 309 per km². The Château de Saint-Maurice, or Château des Gouverneurs, locks the plain together with the 12th-century medieval bridge crossing the Rhône to the Vaud bank; the chapel of Notre-Dame du Scex and the underground forts of Cindey and Scex complete this defensive ensemble. Residents, nicknamed Agaunois or Saints-Mauriards, are also called Peca-Porè — 'leek eaters' in Valais dialect. The municipality's coat of arms, attested on banners from 1434, bears a trefoil cross referencing Maurice d'Agaune.

Why this place is remarkable

Few Swiss towns hold such a constrained geography: the Rhône on one side, a sheer cliff on the other, and between the two, fifteen centuries of uninterrupted religious history since the abbey's founding in 515. The same defile that once guarded the passage — toll gate, watchtower, then the Château des Gouverneurs and its 12th-century bridge — explains why the town has always been an obligatory point of passage, from the medieval pilgrimage to Rome to today's motorway.

History and origin

The place's ancient name, Agaune (Acaunum), gave way to Saint-Maurice after the legendary massacre of the Theban Legion, whose leader Maurice gave his name to the town and to the abbey founded in 515. The municipality occupies a defile where the Rhône runs alongside a sheer cliff; this narrowness explains the presence, from before the 6th century, of a toll gate and a watchtower on the rock, before the Château des Gouverneurs and its 12th-century bridge took over that role.